Wipro Ltd faces an annual dent up to $100 million as American cosmetics brand, Estée Lauder, has shifted the Bengaluru tech services company's share of work in a half-billion dollar, five-year deal to Accenture Plc.
This latest development raises questions on chief executive officer (CEO) Srini Pallia's turnaround plan and growth at Wipro, as outsourcers pivot towards generative artificial intelligence, or GenAI, solutions, analysts said.
According to four people in the know, Accenture will now handle key IT functions of The Estée Lauder Companies Inc including finance, database management, and back-end management for the New York-based cosmetics company.
Early in February, Estée Lauder had announced the Accenture contract but there was no information on that business moving away from Wipro.
“In the second quarter, we've established our new Enterprise Business Services, selecting Accenture to transform how we deliver shared services globally as we accelerate the deployment of AI throughout the organization,” said Stéphane de la Faverie, chief executive of Estée Lauder, during the company’s post earnings conference call on 5 February.
Emails sent to Wipro and Estée Lauder on Monday went unanswered.
$100 million or 1% revenue hit
Mint learns that much of the work awarded to Accenture was part of a February 2021 deal won by Wipro. The Bengaluru company had reportedly bagged the $500 million contract with Estée Lauder, which was supposed to run for five years. This translates to $100 million on a yearly basis.
“Tech transfer work to Accenture is going on in many units and this work will go on until July,” said one of the four executives with knowledge of the matter. This person and the other three executives wanted to stay unnamed.
Wipro CEO Pallia was credited with bagging this account while transitioning from the role of president of the consumer business to head of the Americas business. A second executive said Wipro had won the account against a consortium of Accenture, HCLTech and Infosys in 2021.
Should Wipro entirely lose this account now, it will see $100 million vanish from its topline, or almost 1% of revenue. This comes at a time the company is staring at a third straight year of revenue decline.
Industry #4 Wipro needs to report its fastest sequential fourth quarter growth of 1.86% to match last year’s revenue of $10.51 billion. For now, Wipro’s management has guided for a fourth-quarter revenue of $2.64-2.69 billion, which implies a full-year revenue decline at the lower end of the range.
Wipro's shares on the National Stock Exchange have lost 24.58% since the start of the calendar year, while the Nifty IT index contracted 20.69% in this time.
Estée Lauder, which follows a July-June financial calendar, ended last fiscal with $14.33 billion, down 8% on a yearly basis. This marked the company’s third year of revenue decline, which it attributed to a post-covid slump in travel retail and contracted business from China. In 2024, the company embarked on a restructuring plan, as part of which it would partner with fewer managed services providers to handle its IT needs.
A third executive attributed the client slippage to Estée Lauder’s restructuring program, adding “that scope extension would potentially hurt margins as more companies started bidding for vendor consolidation deals”.
Estée Lauder also got new tech leaders last year. Brian Franz and Rene Lammers took over as chief technology, data, and analytics officer and chief research and innovation officer in April 2025 and October 2025, respectively.
GenAI transition hits home
At least one analyst raised concerns about Wipro losing the deal.
“Wipro is focusing on increasing margin while others such as Accenture are focused on very competitive pricing delivered through AI transformation. Wipro is contracting and is increasingly seen as lagging on the AI transformation,” said Peter Bendor-Samuel, founder of Everest Group, adding the IT firm's growth woes will continue.
Wipro’s Estée Lauder deal in 2021 was the second big ticket one won under former chief executive Thierry Delaporte. The first was a $700 million contract signed with Metro AG in December 2020 with an option to extend it for four years for $300 million. The Bengaluru company has struggled to win deals valued at $1 billion or above since then.
When Pallia took over as CEO in April 2024, he was tasked to turn around the Wipro's fortunes after the absence of large deals and mounting costs threatened growth and profitability. He capped the splurge on acquisitions, cut travel costs, and promoted several old-timers to top jobs.
On business, he made an early impact with two large contracts in less than a year. In March 2025, Wipro bagged a $650 million contract, spread over 10 years, from UK insurer Phoenix Group. This followed a five-year contract valued at $500 million with an unnamed American communications company in June 2024.
Yet, growth has not been promising and the company is expected to grow slower than larger peers this year at the top end of its guidance.
Much of this can be attributed to client slippages. The company lost half a dozen accounts that fetch the company annual revenue of $100 million and upwards since Pallia took over as chief executive on 6 April 2024. The number of such accounts has fallen to 16 at the end of the quarter just gone by versus 22 as of 31 March 2024.
An added challenge on Pallia is the spectre of GenAI, which has upended business due its automation capabilities. While the CEO eyes the new technology as an opportunity, Wipro has still not disclosed revenue from AI unlike peers Tata Consultancy Services Ltd, Infosys Ltd and HCL Technologies Ltd.
A second analyst suggested the Estée Lauder move is aimed at rapidly adopting AI to keep up with competition.
“In AI-sensitive sectors such as beauty and consumer products, companies like Estée Lauder know they cannot afford to move slowly while competitors weaponize data, personalization, and intelligent automation," said Phil Fersht, chief executive of HFS Research.
“That is where Accenture is positioning itself effectively, offering a unified delivery model and what many executives describe as a ‘one throat to choke’ structure. When speed, integration, and measurable outcomes matter, having a single accountable partner across strategy, build, and run becomes a compelling proposition.”